Despite the scarcity of water in Saudi Arabia, yet the Kingdom has made big strides in the agricultural sector. Thanks to the wise policy adopted by the Saudi government, it has been encouraging framers and providing them with incentives including soft interest-free loans. The Kingdom has attained success in wheat production and it has become a wheat exporting county within a short span of time after being a wheat importing country. In the light of the current and future trends pertaining to the strategy of agricultural development which aims at attaining balance between the water security and the food security in a manner that realizes sustainable agriculture and diversification of the productive base, the production of grains declined from 4.86 million tons to 2.952 million tons between 1994 to 2003, but the production of vegetables and fruits had shown a hike. In 2003, the area cultivated with grains amounted to 699, 221 hectares, while the area allocated for production of grains and fodders, up to the end of 2003, amounted to about 700,000 hectares. The area allocated for production of vegetables in the same year exceeded 114,000 hectares. --MORE
